Arkena Wyrnspire
Turalyon 514
2681
   |
Posted - 2013.08.21 19:12:00 -
[1] - Quote
CCP Cmdr Wang wrote:BARDAS wrote:What are these patch notes that people speak of? Do you by chance mean the arcane scribble that magically appears 24 hours before a change takes place thus preventing any meaningful feedback from the community which could potentially prevent problems before they occur? If so yeah I may have heard about those once a while back. Its a shame we don't see them sooner for the aforementioned reason. How are you going to give us meaningful feedback before you even try the changes? Or is your brain so awesome that you can look into the future? And while we are on the subject of feedback, guys, a few one liners and a catch word here and there really doesn't help. If you really care about improving the game, then please structure your feedback in a way that will: 1. List specific issues and the circumstance when it happened. We then put these in a weekly report and discuss them with the dev team on ways to address this. 2. Provide insight on why you think this is happening, if you can. Translation, explain as best as you can on how to reproduce the error/bug you encountered. The patch notes are there to let players know what changes are coming so they can plan their gameplay accordingly, not so that people can theory craft before hand on how things will work before they actually try it.
IGÇÖm not taking issue with the suggestion of better feedback here. I agree with it wholeheartedly.
However, there is a huge, huge problem here. Specifically;
CCP Cmdr Wang wrote:
How are you going to give us meaningful feedback before you even try the changes? Or is your brain so awesome that you can look into the future?
This is the part which I simply cannot understand. Does this mean that any pre-patch feedback is seen as a pointless exercise? Is expressing our initial reaction completely futile?
I find it extraordinary that CCP can have this viewpoint. In almost every patch the playerbase has anticipated a problem before it was even released, problems which take months to fix because apparently our feedback is useless.
When did this feedback fail to prove its value?
Was it when people cried out about the flaylock before its release when a video showed an emphasis on shooting at the feet?
Was it when the suit datadump came and the Caldari Logistics suit was immediately highlighted as the best option?
Was it when the Tactical Assault Rifle jumped into widespread use so quickly on release?
The list goes on; Plasma Cannons, the new armour plates, LAV health buffs. There are a great number of these problems, and all of them were seen by the playerbase before release or immediately on release before even playing a match.
This comes so soon after the entire CPM writes an excellent post with huge support from the community about the state of GÇ£Communication and TrustGÇ¥. Where is this communication and trust?
ItGÇÖs notable that some people within CCP are doing this fine. CCP FoxFour, and to a lesser extent CCP Wolfman, are actually in touch with the community and take into account feedback from players, even before things are released. FoxFour is a shining example of this - talking to players in IRC, posting on the forums frequently, thinking about what people have said rather than sticking doggedly to the initial plan.
And hey, weGÇÖve got a dev blog and a sticky about what those two are doing! Released before the patch notes, and people are speaking to them about it and they are as well.
Notably, as a great merc once said:
gbghg wrote:CCP Reykjavik
CCP Shanghai
Same company different studios, one has near perfected the player feedback process, the other is still rolling on the floor after it fell over its first baby step.
Why is it that CCP Reykjavik have posted their suggested changes a month before making them, and especially listening to feedback and even completely revising their plans?
https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=topics&f=270
Look at the stickies in that section and then look at the stickies in our forums. There is a disparity there.
I understand that Sony delays may have some effect on this. But these threads are posted a month in advance of the patch - there is no reason that changes canGÇÖt be revised before content-locking the patch.
To conclude, no, we donGÇÖt have a brain that can magically foresee the future. But we do have a degree of common sense that often doesnGÇÖt seem to be present in some changes. What genuine reason is there to withhold patch notes?
|